Saturday, August 29, 2009

Botany

So, Sabrina comes to get me in an hour and we're going to ride our bikes to the Botanic Gardens way out in the burbs. It's roughly a 40 mile bike ride. I am so ready! It's cool and the sun just came out and we have all day and no time constraints! So yeah, I'm down with it.

I'm also down with being out of the house most of the day.

Why you ask?

Because this dog sitting thing is for the birds!

We're taking care of Muffy, a tiny shmoop of a dog. She's the dog of our old neighbor Mrs. Peterson. Mrs. Peterson is 72 and nimble as a butterfly, but she can't see very well. Muffy was hours away from death before Mrs. Peterson found her, and now, is gracing us with her fine presence. Mrs. Peterson is in France and my sweet husband who sometimes can care too much, offered to take Muff for THREE WEEKS.

So here we are.

Muffy is a little ball of love, no doubt. She crawls right up on you and just collapses in a ball of love. Muffy is also one of the dumbest dogs I've ever known. We're pretty sure she doesn't know her name. She doesn't know sit or wait or lie down or no or get down or get off or stop sticking your tongue in my nose. Every thing is her business, just someone walking out of their own house is her business and she must stop and stare. A dog going by - stopping and staring. A siren? Stop and stare. A piece of wet old garbage going by? Stop and stare.

She's extremely unfocused which can make it frustrating on walks. Certainly we have our walks down with Remo, we all move pretty quickly and have our own way, poor Muffy stops to stare at a leaf that jumped up at her and she'll stand there for 20 minutes.

You even look at Remo and there's Muffy, looking at you looking at Remo. If Remo goes to get water, there goes Muffy, she needs water now too. Remo goes to play with a toy, there's Muffy. Remo goes to take a whizz by his favorite tree, there's Muffy, standing right under the pee spray.

It's a good test for us for sure, we've talked about getting another dog...but I don't think we're in any rush anymore. We may miss Muffy when she's gone, but I believe oh I believe that absence makes the heart grow oh so fonder.

After hanging at your pad with Muffy (who I at first kept calling Molly, to which John would reply, "it doesn't matter...she doesn't even know her name"), I can confirm the following:

1) I've never met at dog that looked more like an Ewok. Oddly, enough, it's the teeth I think.

2) She is totally co-dependent (like, on a neurotic level.)

3) She is dumber than a bag of hammers.

I was in the same boat some years back, I wanted to get another dog - I grew up with two dogs and they tend to socialize better and are less stressed when they have a buddy in the house.

I fell into the same situation. I house sat for a neighbor's dog that, while generally sweet, completely wore on both my nerves and Olive's. It totally turned me off to getting another dog.

Now, Olive is 10, pretty set in her ways, extremely territorial and I live in a postage stamp-sized place. Not a good recipe for bringing a newbie in.

I realise now that, I missed the window.

1) I waited to long to bring another dog into the house.

2) Not every dog is that nutty dog I sat for.

Had I taken the time to find a good match for Olive, I would be a 2 dog household now. To be honest, I feel a bit guilty for her sake that I never followed thru. She spends a LOT of time on her own (and that's with me dragging her to lots and lots of stuff.)

My advice, after you hand Muffy back, wait about 2-3 months - no longer- and then really think about if you want to bring in another dog.